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House Update: Trump Calls to Congratulate Pelosi

House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi of California, accompanied by House members and Senate Democrats, gestures during a news conference on Capitol Hill last September. (Jose Luis Magana / AP)

Editor’s note: Below is a selection of The Associated Press’ updates about contests around the country for seats in the U.S. House of Representatives. More news and commentary about midterm election results will be posted soon on Truthdig.

WASHINGTON — The Latest on elections to the U.S. House of Representatives (all times local):12:50 a.m.President Donald Trump has called to congratulate Democratic House Leader Nancy Pelosi as her party stood on the brink of recapturing the House of Representatives.White House press secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders said the president made a series of calls while watching the election results late Tuesday. Pelosi’s spokesman Drew Hammill said Trump called Pelosi to congratulate her and to note her tone of bipartisanship. Sanders says Trump also called Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell “to congratulate him on historic Senate gains.”Trump also called outgoing House Speaker Paul Ryan and Democratic Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer.And he called several Republican winners for whom he campaigned in recent weeks, including incoming Missouri Sen. Josh Hawley, incoming Ohio governor Mike DeWine and incoming Florida Sen. Rick Scott.

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12:40 a.m.Republican Steve King has won a ninth term representing northwest Iowa’s 4th Congressional District. Voters re-elected King despite a string of controversies about comments and meetings he has held involving other candidates and groups characterized as white nationalists. King has argued that all those he met or made comments about were simply conservatives. King defeated Democrat J.D. Scholten, a former minor league baseball player who raised more money than King and spent months crisscrossing the 39-county district. King did little campaigning but maintained his hardline views on immigration and support of gun rights were in step with the conservative district.___12:20 a.m.Women will break the current record of 84 serving at once in the U.S. House.With ballots still being counted across the country, women have won 75 seats and are assured of victory in nine districts where women are the only major-party candidates.Outrage and organizing by women have defined Democratic Party politics this election cycle — from the Women’s March opposing President Donald Trump the day after he was inaugurated in January 2017 through a stream of sexual assault accusations later that year that sparked the #MeToo movement.

More than 230 women, many of them first-time candidates, were on the general-election ballots in House races.

Despite the gains, men will continue to hold the vast majority of House seats.

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12:15 a.m.

Democrats have picked up at least 23 House seats, putting them on track to reach the 218 needed to seize control from Republicans after eight years.

Democrats knocked off at least 17 GOP incumbents, picking up moderate, suburban districts across the county. Democrats won seats stretching from suburban Washington, New York and Philadelphia to outside Miami, Chicago and Denver. West Coast results were still coming in.

House Democratic leader Nancy Pelosi is hailing “a new day in America.”

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11:55 p.m.Nancy Pelosi is telling Democratic lawmakers and supporters that elections are about the future and “thank you all for making the future better for all of America’s children.” Pelosi spoke as Democrats closed in on control of the House. Pelosi said the election Tuesday was about more than Republicans and Democrats. It was about restoring the Constitution and providing a balance to the Trump administration. She says the election is also about stopping what she described as the GOP’s attacks on entitlement programs and the Affordable Care Act. She says Democrats will find common ground when they can and stand their ground when necessary.___11:50 p.m.Democrats are moving toward control of the House. They’ve picked up moderate, suburban districts across the Northeast and Midwest as they get closer to the 23 seats they need to wrest control from Republicans.Republican incumbent Reps. Rod Blum and David Young of Iowa, Randy Hultgren of Illinois, Leonard Lance of New Jersey and Pete Sessions of Texas all lost contested races.Democrat Abby Finkenauer beat Blum and will be among the youngest women ever elected to the House. Democrat Cindy Axne beat Young, and Lauren Underwood, a 32-year-old African-American nurse, topped Hultgren.

Democrat Sean Casten has defeated six-term Republican Rep. Peter Roskam to flip a suburban Chicago district the GOP has held for more than four decades.

Casten, a scientist and businessman, argued that Roskam was too conservative for a district that supported Hillary Clinton over President Donald Trump in 2016. Casten pointed to Roskam’s record of opposing abortion and his record of voting along with Trump.

Casten focused his campaign on health care and has called for stricter gun control laws.

Roskam insisted he’s a moderate who opposed Trump when necessary. He criticized Casten as wanting to raise taxes and for name-calling and “embracing the politics of ridicule.”

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10:35 p.m.First-time Democratic candidate Jason Crow has defeated five-term Republican Rep. Mike Coffman in suburban Denver.Crow, 39, is a former Army Ranger and captain who fought in Iraq. He then went to work at a politically-connected Denver law firm before taking on Coffman, who has survived repeated strong Democratic challenges in the diverse district. Hillary Clinton won the district by nine points in 2016 while Coffman won it by eight. Coffman is an Army and Marine veteran and is active on veterans’ issues. But Crow used his own military service to neutralize Coffman’s advantage. Crow also embraced the cause of gun control in a district that was home to the 2012 Aurora theater shooting that killed 12 and abuts Columbine High School, where two teen-aged gunmen killed 13 in 1999.___10:20 p.m.Democratic newcomer Sharice Davids has defeated incumbent Rep. Kevin Yoder in Kansas to become the nation’s first LGBT Native American in Congress. The 38-year-old activist, lawyer and political newcomer already garnered national attention as part of a crop of diverse Democratic candidates.Yoder was endorsed by President Donald Trump, but the suburban Kansas City district voted for Democrat Hillary Clinton in 2016. The district is a mix of fast-growing bedroom communities, established suburbs and poorer city neighborhoods.Davids emerged from a six-person Democratic primary and energized voters and Democratic donors by emphasizing her biography. Her history includes mixed martial arts fights.

She’s a member of the Wisconsin-based Ho-Chunk Nation and was raised by a single mother who served in the Army and worked for the U.S. Postal Service.

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10:10 p.m.

Democratic businessman Dean Phillips has defeated Republican Rep. Erik Paulsen in a suburban Minnesota district that figures heavily into Democrats’ hopes for a House takeover.

Paulsen had easily won elections throughout his five terms in office even as the Minneapolis-area district trended toward Democrats.

But the district favored Hillary Clinton by nearly 10 points two years ago, and a statewide poll late in the race showed Phillips with a comfortable lead. Outside groups poured more than $10 million into the battleground race.

Phillips ran his family’s liquor company and started a chain of local coffee shops. He painted Paulsen as too in-step with President Donald Trump, though Paulsen tried to distance himself from the president.

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10:05 p.m.

Newly minted Democratic Rep. Conor Lamb of Pennsylvania has defeated three-term Republican Rep. Keith Rothfus in the nation’s only House race pitting two incumbents against each other.

Democrats enjoy a 71,000-voter registration edge in the suburban Pittsburgh district, and Lamb comfortably led polls over Rothfus, who has one of Pennsylvania’s most conservative voting records in Congress.

Lamb won a special election in March to succeed Republican Rep. Tim Murphy, who resigned, in a district that Trump won by about 20 points.

Both men live in the new 17th District, despite living in different districts that they currently represent.

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10 p.m.Democrat Debbie Mucarsel-Powell has defeated Republican Rep. Carlos Curbelo in Florida, the second GOP incumbent House member to fall. Curbelo, a moderate and critic of President Donald Trump, was trying to defy the political winds against Trump in the South Florida district. Mucarsel-Powell is an immigrant from Ecuador who has worked for several nonprofit organizations in Miami-Dade County. She ran on preventing gun violence and protecting the environment, but her main focus was on health care and the Affordable Care Act, which Curbelo voted to repeal. Mucarsel-Powell painted Curbelo as a politician who talks like a moderate but tends to vote with conservatives. Curbelo is a leader of the bipartisan Climate Caucus and bucked GOP leadership this summer by supporting a tax on emissions of carbon dioxide, a contributor to global warming.___9:20 p.m.Democrat Ayanna Pressley has completed her quest to become Massachusetts’ first black woman elected to Congress.

Pressley is also the first African-American to serve on the Boston City Council. She sailed through Tuesday’s general election to Congress unopposed, two months after unseating 10-term Rep. Michael Capuano in a primary that was a national political stunner.

With no Republican in the race in the heavily Democratic district, her upset victory in the primary had all but assured Pressley the House seat, with only the remote possibility of a write-in campaign to potentially stop her.

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9:00 p.m.

Republican Rep. Andy Barr of Kentucky won a close-fought race that Democrats had targeted in a bid to shift the House to Democratic control.

Barr turned back a strong challenge from Democrat Amy McGrath in a district that supported President Donald Trump two years ago.

McGrath, a retired fighter pilot, gave Barr his toughest test yet as he sought a fourth term. Barr urged voters to re-elect him for his “access and influence with this administration,” while McGrath countered with a message of “country over party.”

Barr won by 22 points in 2016, but McGrath waged an aggressive challenge, including TV ads showing her in front of fighter jets and with her young children.

The district includes Lexington and capital Frankfort. The seat has switched parties five times since 1978.

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8:50 p.m.

In Indiana, Greg Pence, an older brother of Vice President Mike Pence, has won a heavily Republican House seat that his famous sibling once held.

The 61-year-old Pence, an owner of two antique malls, defeated Democrat Jeannine Lee Lake, who publishes a bi-monthly Muncie newspaper.

The eastern Indiana seat is open because Republican Rep. Luke Messer ran in the GOP primary for the Senate. Greg Pence is one of Mike Pence’s three brothers.

Greg Pence is a Marine veteran and once ran a now-bankrupt chain of convenience stores.

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8:30 p.m.

Republican Rep. Barbara Comstock of Virginia was the first congressional incumbent to lose as voters in her Northern Virginia district expressed their continued dislike of President Donald Trump.

Democratic state Sen. Jennifer Wexton won an easy victory in the wealthy suburban district outside Washington, which Hillary Clinton won by 10 percentage points.

Comstock tried hard to emphasize her independence from Trump, but Wexton, a former prosecutor, portrayed the two-term incumbent as a Trump ally out of touch with the diverse, well-educated district.

Comstock easily beat a Democrat in 2016 when her district went for Clinton.

The national focus on the race helped Comstock and Wexton raise more than $5 million in all, while outside groups spent more than $10 million.

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8:25 p.m.

Donna Shalala has won a U.S. House seat in Florida, making her the first Democrat to flip a GOP seat on Tuesday night.

After serving in President Bill Clinton’s Cabinet and running major universities, Shalala is starting a third career with her election to the House.

The 77-year-old Democrat won Tuesday in a Miami district that had long been in Republican hands. Shalala has sought to turn her age into a positive by stressing her experience with this slogan: “Ready on Day One.”

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7:30 p.m.

Polls have closed in several East Coast states as voters decide control of Congress and statehouses across the nation.

A tight Kentucky congressional race in a district President Donald Trump won by double digits could be an early indicator whether the House will shift to Democratic control.

Retired fighter pilot Amy McGrath has given Republican incumbent Andy Barr his toughest test yet as he seeks a fourth term outside Lexington.

In suburban Atlanta, Republican Rep. Karen Handel faced a strong challenge from Lucy McBath, whose 17-year-old son was shot and killed at a gas station.

In Virginia, GOP. Rep. Barbara Comstock was trying to fend off political newcomer Jennifer Wexton, while one-time tea party favorite Rep. Dave Brat faced off against Democrat Abigail Spanberger, a former CIA operative.

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2 p.m.

In the battle for control of the House, Democrats are increasingly confident they’ll pick up the 23 seats needed to seize control and flip the majority.

They are counting on voter enthusiasm and the strength of their candidates to carry them to victory. More women than ever are running, along with military veterans and minorities, in districts across the country.

Republicans predict they’ll lose seats but hold a slim majority based on what they say is a healthy economy.

The midterm elections are typically difficult for the party in power. This year it’s become a referendum on President Donald Trump and GOP control of Congress.

House Republicans took control in 2010 during then-President Barack Obama’s first term.